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Henry Rollins: Mon Cher Maverique

Mr. McCain, I hope you do not take offense at this letter or the sentiments expressed herein. I am not voting against you. I am voting for someone else.

With all due respect, I want you to lose. I don't say this out anger or any desire to gloat, nor will I attain any real satisfaction should you lose. My overall feeling will be relief, pure and simple. I will be relieved and elated that millions of Americans saw through your cheap and below-the-belt campaign, your wildly reckless choice of running mate, and, most importantly, the fact that you have no real plans to take America in any new direction.

I will be happy that America chose to leave you in the past with Ronald Reagan, endless war, and all that drilling. Should you lose your home state of Arizona to your opponent, that will be quite a slap. How will the press coddle you through this one? Perhaps they will say that you're such a maverick (let's take that one out of the dictionary, shall we?) that you really didn't lose the state so much as you broke from it. Nice.Your straight talk was anything but, and over the last few weeks running up to the election, your campaign was desperate, mean-spirited, and reeked of sore loser. You do understand that America will be much better off if you don't win, right, or is that talk a little too straight for you to handle?

If you lose, what will the future hold, Mr. McCain? Another term as senator? Think you can win? Want to risk losing again? Feeling tired? Wondering if Palin is already off the express and planning her 2012 run? Are you going to campaign for her? If you win, your four years will be remembered as an intermission as America tries to recover from the last eight. In that time people will still be talking about your opponent with more passion and heartfelt emotion than they'll ever apply to you.

If you lose, you will set the world's record for fastest falling footnote in American history. Should this happen, don't despair; the Smithsonian is preparing a glass box for you next to Johnny Carson's desk.

You never know, soon there could very well be two words/six syllables that might feel like torture for you to say: President Obama.